Chatting About Death

So, the matriarch doesn't want to be alive anymore. She told me she does nothing but sleep and eat. I would think she is bored. It's not that there is nothing I can do, the matriarch doesn't want to do anything. She has every excuse going to avoid participation in anything but a meal out. I know that sounds cruel but it is very real and true to our current status. I have offered to take her to card games, to seniors' centres, to hospital visitation; she wants none of it. She sometimes wants to go shopping and often wants to eat out; but, generally, she seems to want to sit in her room. When she talks to me about death, I tell her maybe if she saw more of the world, she wouldn't want to die. The matriarch thinks I mean a trip to Alaska and not the library. I have a very charitable view of the world: you get out of it what you put into it; someone who does nothing isn't likely to have an optimistic perspective. It is very sad.

The matriarch told me of a prayer her mother taught her when she was young; I asked her why she didn't teach it to my husband. My mother-in-law never thought of it. So much centres around her existence and not shared family experiences; sometimes, I think, the matriarch feels left out of life because she must have started excluding herself when she was much younger. I met her when she was almost eighty. Her family in Chatham didn't seem to forget about her; family in Barrie didn't forget about her; and my husband, most certainly, has been there for his mother. I don't know why she has always felt left out. I don't know. I told the matriarch she was alive for a reason; I don't know what that reason is but there must be one and sitting in her room thinking about it probably won't lead to its revelation. She is upstairs sitting in her chair continuing to worry about life rather than live it....not a thing I can do.